Friday Night Bug Juice

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Welcome to Friday Night Bug Juice, a Metro Detroit bar review site. We're here to give you a look into the dive bars of the Detroit area, so you can hopefully spend your cash wisely, and get a little insight into the lives of a couple of hapless irish louts.

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Welcome to the section of our site where you can learn everything you ever wanted to know and way too much more about the gang that works hard ruining their livers to bring you all you need to know about the dive bars of the Metro Detroit area!

GROOVE LOUNGE

    Tony and I go for a two mile walk four days a week during our lunch break because we don’t see enough of each other on the drive to and from work, forty hours a week at work, Friday nights, Michigan football games, various holidays and assorted weekend gatherings.
   One of the favorite topics on these walks is Friday Night and the horseshit web site devoted to Friday Night (you probably feel it should be better than it is, given the amount of time spent talking about it).  
   On Monday:  “ Last Friday at Edison’s was pretty damn great...I like being a regular at a bar, you just hold up one or two fingers and your beer arrives...Why would we go anywhere else?”
  On Tuesday:  “Christ, we haven’t actually reviewed a bar in months...Where should we go?..That damned web site.”
  On Wednesday’s lunch break, we eat at Potbelly’s, pick the male and female douche of the week in Real Detroit Magazine, play two games of backgammon in a cutthroat race to one hundred and hustle back to work.
   On Thursday:  “We could go to The Well in Dearborn...How about Hamtramck?...I’ll check some web sites out tonight and see what I can find.”
   On Friday:  “This has been one tough week...If it wasn’t for the web site, I would go to Edison’s every week...Nobody reads the damn thing anyway, let’s go to Edison’s.” 
    So, after five months of not stepping foot into a new bar for the purpose of a review, Tony and I decided that this last Friday should see the two great adventurers adventuring.  Based largely on the recommendation of Detroit Free Press writer Esa Esan, young brother and I decided to go back to “work” and visit/review the Groove Lounge in Southfield. 
   In her glowing recommendation, Esan noted that Groove lounge was catering to the over 30 crowd, was large, had a band and dance floor and a wood-fired pizza oven in the kitchen ( eating while on The Tour is strictly prohibited, though tearing through kitchen cupboards after closing time is encouraged).  It sounded promising to our (hairy) ears, so we resisted the pull of Edison’s and set sail for Groove Lounge.
   I had scouted the place earlier in the week, so we had no trouble finding the bright orange building on Franklin Road at Northwestern.  Parking was easy enough in the large lot shared by a wedding hall and drug store.  For those that believe in foreshadowing, the skies opened up and pissed on us as soon as we stepped out of the truck.
   We hustled to the door at the side of the building and walked into a huge bar populated by about twenty people, none of whom appeared to be over thirty ( so much for catering to an older crowd) or interested in having a good time.  Small cliques sat hunched over their drinks, paying no heed to the two crestfallen Irishmen entering the bar.
   “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”  I think Tony wanted to leave.
   I’m the older brother, the one with the cool head and I insisted that we grab at least one quick beer at the nearly deserted long bar.  There, we could rationally plot the inevitable next move.
   Despite the absence of paying customers, the sloppy barmaid at the end of the bar placed us squarely in the pay me no nevermind club.  Anthony and I grew more agitated by the second, and just as we were about to pull the plug sans beer, she bounced our way.  Wait, false alarm!  She held up one chubby finger, waltzed by and did some non-essential business at the opposite end of the bar.  As strange as this may sound, I was now so pissed off that I couldn’t leave.
   Finally, this disgrace to barmaids everywhere came by to take our order.
   “What can I get you ?”
   “ A Miller Light and a Labatts, please.
   “Bottle or draft?”
   “ Bottle.”
   “We don’t have Labatts in a bottle.”
   Tony leaned in. 
   “How about a Michelob Light in a bottle.”
    A roll of heavily made up eyes.
   “We don’t have Michelob Light in a bottle, how about Michelob Ultra?”
   “No thanks, what else do you have in bottles?”
    Literal sigh of disgust from Miss Congeniality.
   “We’ve got everything in bottles.”
   Since we were just informed that they didn’t have Labatts or Michelob Light in bottles, Tony and I looked at each other for a moment and said nothing.
   Clearly disgusted at having to deal with us, she took a deep breath from inside her barrel chest, used her most “I am annoyed with the two dumb dicks in front of me” voice, and started what she felt would be a long recitation .
   “I’ve got Bud, Bud Light...”
   “Bud.”  So much for the long recitation ( Tony is not typically a Bud Man, but he wanted to cut our losses and took one for the team).
   I never expected that getting two beers in a nearly deserted bar would be such a pain in the ass, and I surely never expected to be treated with such disdain by someone paid to make drinks appear and be nice, or at worst, neutral.
   There was a band playing breezy R+B, though nobody danced, or seemed to listen for that matter.  The most dominant characteristic of this dump, after the crap attitude of the barmaid, was the heavy smell of campfire.  That wood fired pizza oven ballyhooed in the Free Press article was toiling in the kitchen.  In the open, no-walls-to-keep-the-stink off-you-kitchen.  The smell of burning wood was so overriding that Tony was afraid it would kill his industrial strength cologne.
   Thinking quickly, we guzzled our beers and began the fifteen minute trek to Edison’s to salvage the night.  We did this in one of the heaviest downpours I have ever driven through.  I had to drive slowly, so it gave Our Kid and I a chance to ruminate on Groove Lounge.  Tony wanted to know how Free Press writer Esan could write the story.  “We didn’t catch this place on a bad night, I bet it’s never crowded period, let alone with the over thirty crowd”.  Maybe she wrote her piece from a press release or phone call, little brother.  Not everyone goes into the field to get their stories, just us great ones.  
   Knowing the  ever changing history of this establishment (It was Excalibur’s and Pi Lounge before it was Groove Lounge), my speculation centered on when this current edition would shut down (soon!) and what it would morph into (an upscale sports bar?).  I decided that even if it turned into a urologist’s office, it would be a better place to visit.
   I guess the bigger question centers around wether it is wise to leave the mother’s milk that is Edison’s and check out other bars for the purpose of reviewing.  We feel it is.  We won’t let the literal and attitudinal stink of Groove Lounge spoil the explorer inside.
   Onward!
PS  As an off the subject aside, I have been given the senior discount for coffee at McDonald’s three times in the past couple of weeks.  Either there is a new directive under the Golden Arches to give anyone anywhere near senior citizen status the discount, or I have entered the fast lane of aging. 
Cheers! Jim


Groove Lounge 
28875 Franklin Road 
Southfield 48034
248-208-7500



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BLAH

   Have you ever felt not funny?  Keep wise ass answers such as, “When have you ever been funny?” to yourself.
   It will be better for my mental well being (and for the purposes of this blog) to believe that everybody has low spots in their lives.  I am more interested in what puts you in those low spots and how you drag yourself out.
   I have existed in one of those lulls for the past month or so, and as a guy who loves looking under the rocks of life, I have been examining what put me there and what can extract me.
   As for the former,  I am placing some of the blame on the weather.  I never need to experience a Michigan winter or spring again.  The never ending variety of cold stuff falling from the sky, smothering cloud cover, gray and sheer length of these two seasons is killing me.  I take a daily med to prevent migraines (it’s called propranolol and has saved my life), that renders my hands and feet cold during the warmest days and freezing in winter and spring.  Painful!  I also love and miss outdoor activities such as swimming, tennis and drinking beer.  I understand that you can perform these three sports indoors, but to enjoy them at their fullest means being outside.  To give you an idea of the depths of my disgust for the Michigan weather, I have adopted Anna Maria Island in Florida as my fantasy home and have dreamed about relocating to this southern Xanadu (I fantasize about fishing, and I hate fishing). 
   Work has also been a pill.  I understand that the country is in a recession, and that Michigan has been hit harder than most, but I am sick of cost cutting, watching pennies and the “I’m just glad to have a job” mantra.  Like many companies, my place of employment has cut staff to a minimum.  This means more and harder work for those still employed.  Stress, both physical and mental, is the result.  I am whipped at day’s end.  My voice, mind and spirit are waning.  I fall asleep on the sofa most evenings, though once in a while I have the wherewithal to actually get up and go to bed.  Still, I’m just glad to have a job.
   Finally, a cloud of sadness has settled over my extended family, a cloud as large and oppressive as any real cloud that we’ve experienced this never ending winter.  My mom’s older sister Mary Lou died recently.  It was rough on everybody, though the effect it had on my Mom bothered me most.  Anxiety was not limited to my side of the street.  My wife and her extended family have been dealing with issues related to age and health during this lengthy hibernation period.  Like my feelings toward my mom, it has been most difficult watching the wear and tear on my Andrea.  When the phone rings and your wife says ”Oh No” before she knows who is on the line, it’s a bad thing.   In general, I have heard more about sickness, age and death in the last six months than in the rest of my life combined.  A function of getting older with older friends and relatives, no doubt.
   
   That is what put me in a mood.  Now what will get me out?
   The day before Easter, my oldest son Max pulled out some old family videos and we sat around looking at them.  I watched images of my birthday in 1990, Easter 1991 and a vacation in Myrtle Beach in 1992. 
   This could go one of two ways.  I could sink further into a funk looking at full heads of hair, vigorous parents and laughing families.  Or, I could think about what made the people in those old videos so damn happy.  I chose the latter.
   Full head of hair Jim didn’t worry so much ( in all candor, I probably never had a full head of hair).  He did not obsess about tomorrow.  Young kids will do that to you, you’re only concerned about their next bowel movement or nap.  Whatever the reason, it’s a good way to be.  Living in the moment is proper, worrying about ten minutes from now is a waste of time.  I also laughed a lot.  We laughed at how the kids swam, how my mom and I walked (like two bears) and how my mom hated to have the camera pointed at her.  Laugh more.  In the old home videos, I was doing more stuff, going more places and interacting with more people.  If there is ever a moment in your day when the question arises, “Should we go _______?”, the answer is always yes.  You will either have a good time or it will bite and you will have a good story to tell.  Example:  This past Sunday, my wife Andrea wanted to go to the Women’s Expo in Novi with one of her girlfriends.  Alas, none were available.  Even though the Wings were on later that afternoon and a Women’s Expo seemed dreadful, I went.  I had a good time too.  Andrea and I laughed at the odd variety of booths (apparently chicks are interested in skin care, food, purses and clean carpets), talked adult talk and had a nice lunch.  Any moment with your wife, even one spent at the Sweet Sass booth (“Sweet Sass is the new ketchup”) is better than sitting at home on your ass.
   I’m not stupid, or not that stupid anyway.  I understand that the video camera does not roll on an average Wednesday while you’re cleaning up the dinner dishes.  It rolls on special occasions.  But I stick by my three pronged plan of attack:  Don’t worry, laugh and do stuff.  These are my observations and solutions.  Like plans to get fit, you will have to tailor your plan to match your own set of circumstances.  
   In a desperate attempt to get readers to react to some of the crap on our site, I am asking you what gets you down and how you get out.  If you think I am a witless Mary Sunshine, I would like to hear that as well.
Cheers! Jim
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